


Where I Once Was

by IEatBooksForTea



Category: Until Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-13
Updated: 2016-10-06
Packaged: 2018-05-13 18:58:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 11
Words: 6,843
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5713471
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IEatBooksForTea/pseuds/IEatBooksForTea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if inanimate objects had a voice? What if they thought and felt things just as we do? A one shot collection recording the deaths of the main Until Dawn characters from the perspectives of their beloved possessions.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chris

I used to be able to fit perfectly across the bridge of his nose, my arms hooking effortlessly behind his ears. I used to belong there.

It was through me that he _saw._ Through me that his eyes looked at her, tracing the curve of her smile, the brush of her red hair, the life in her sparkling eyes. He looked at those a lot.

If it hadn't been for me, he'd never have seen her that way. He wouldn't have been able to experience the definitions of her smile, the exact number of freckles on her cheeks, the coordinates of her deep, sloshing eyes. I opened up the world to him.

And now that world? It's falling. Cracking. Spinning out of control.

I fly off his face, my bones snapping and breaking as I hit the ground. The lens he saw through - the ones that let him _really_ see - smash like glass. Crushed like a bug. So easily. Like it never really matter. Like _I_ never mattered.

The girl he looked at so many times screams through a glass door, tumbling to the floor, those eyes, the ones he so admired, raw and spilling with tears. She slams hands to the glass, wanting to break free, to save him, her body composed of purely tears. Bubbling over. Flowing. Like blood. She seems so far away now. I used to see her so easily. So close. Now she's broken in half just like my lenses. Like my limbs.

And he's so distant now. His body broken. His head snapped off. His eyes, lost without me, wide and empty. And hollow. Lost without a world.

His nose and ears are so lonely now. So cold.

I don't belong there anymore.

I sink into the cold, freezing snow; buried, dying. Broken. Me and him. We're the same.


	2. Sam

When she packed me in her bag, I was sizzling in excitement. I was almost convinced I'd end up bursting my own fuse. That wouldn't have been any use when she needed my light.

The bag was cold and cramped. I was squished between a pair of yoga pants and that all too uncomfortable, metallic and rough roped climbing equipment. I'd always prided myself in being the most flattering equipment she had. I always thought I completed her outfit. Her forehead was never fully perfect without me positioned right in the centre of it.

We've spent so many exciting hours together; climbing cliffs, scouring caves, hiking over mountains. She took me everywhere. So this time meant another adventure for the two of us; where she'd rely on me. When she'd thank me over and over for the beam I gave her. I was so _proud_.

But this time. When she took me out of the bag. It wasn't the same.

The atmosphere wasn't exciting. It wasn't fizzling with energy. There was no thrill in the air, waiting for my light to brighten up any area of her life.

It was cold. Dark. Heavy.

The weight on me was harder. It was no longer just a little adventure, a fun outing for the two of us. I no longer had to just give her light. I had to save her life.

Her forehead wasn't so easy to grace now. Sweat pooled there, slipping into my wiring, mingling with my panic and pressure. The mines we'd traipsed through weren't adventurous. They were horror rides, roller coasters that only went down. Mossed, wet walls stinking with rot and death.

She was relying on me so much now. She was depending on me.

And I failed her.

Her body comes crushing to the ground. It clatters with a sickening thump, accompanied by an unearthly shriek. My bulb falters, so close to breaking, as I feel her heartbeat cut out. Her forehead is cold. Empty.

I feel crippled, demolished. Like someone has stepped on my bulb with a heavy boot, crushing me like glass. I've betrayed her. I've let her down.

I've killed her.

My light is still trickling through, shining through cracks in wooden floors, trying to hide away. Hers is gone though. Broken. Never coming back.

Hers is dead.

Like my fuse.


	3. Mike

I've lit a few good fires in my day. Flames, sparks, burning love? I'm the guy to call.

He never really had to call me, though. I was always sat in his pocket, waiting to fit right in that lighter shaped space in his palm. He'd pull me out to light the odd cigarette at the back of the school. But it was always so... _mediocre_.

I've always had an itching in my metal, a rust to burn something _more_. Log fires, bonfires, _cabins_. Flame tasted so _good_ on my tongue; like a boiling hot concoction of methane, charcoal and lust. It was addictive. I never had enough.

But he never really needed me; not very often. Not when he had those irritating, electric _bulbs_. Who do they think they are, hanging from the ceiling like that, all high and mighty? And what did I get? Measly cigarettes. And not even on a regular basis either.

Nicotine tastes so... thick and gungy. Like dense, sludgy tar. I don't know what _he_ ever saw in it? Humans have such a disgusting sense of taste. I prefer the light, featheriness of a flame, dancing and dissolving into my taste buds. It's _spicy._ And _alive_.

Nicotine makes you feel like you're _dead_.

I was honestly considering preparing my gravestone – inscription "Always the cigarette, never the flame" - having practically forgotten the taste of fire already, when he hopped me out of his pocket. And his thumb snapped me open, the flame bursting into life. And I _smelled_ the gas.

It was glorious.

The flame engulfed my metal with heat, rupturing me into life. And I was lighting lanterns, catching torches in flame. Casting glows into dark, gunky tunnels, the drip drip of water teeming to the sound of my exhilarated heartbeat. He was _using_ me. Setting me alight. _Relying_ on me.

And it tasted so _good_.

The gas. It _smelled_ so good.

But this time... it doesn't.

It's too much. I can feel it clinging to my rusting metal like condensation. Like the sweat pooling in his palm. It quivers in the air with anticipation. And so does his thumb against my switch.

I want to turn myself off. Stop myself from lighting any flame. The taste of it isn't worth it. The exhilaration isn't worth it. I try. I try so hard. So much wood around me. It will burn.

The hand that holds me. It will burn.

I can feel the resolve set into his skin. His sweat feels different. Slimy and strong and _scared_.

But he isn't going to stop. He isn't going to pull away from this.

And I wish I could.

The screech echoes, ripping the thick, gassy air like paper. Like wood, splintering in two.

And his thumb, twitching, flicks my switch. For the last time.

Fire explodes around me. The strength, the _heat_ of it catapults me out of his hand. I clatter with a shrill scream on wooden floorboards. They're unstable. They're about the burn. And so am I.

The heat smothers me, bubbling my metal, _melting_ it. It's boiling. It laps at my body, like sizzling water. Sizzling _gas_.

And I can smell that gas. I can smell his _death_. The last of his sweat lingering on my metal as the fire devourers me.

His life incinerated in seconds. _Seconds_. As short as it took to flick my lid open and press down on my switch. _My_. _Me_. It was all _me_. _I_ killed him. With that fire I had so _longed_ to burn.

And I can taste the fire, scorching me, corroding me.

It makes me feel sick.

So does my soul.


	4. Ashley

I remember the scent of her hair vividly. Strawberry and vanilla and _fantasy_. The pulse of her brain always throbbed with thirsts of knowledge and imaginations. I felt the way each detail of life inspired new stories and adventures in her mind, her fingers twitching to write them down. The passing of smiles between two strangers birthed a flourishing story of romance. A cat piecing it's way across rooftops created an ingenious adventure of a feline spy. I felt the most intimately involved in her stories, her fantasies. Like I was right there in them.

But she never once indulged them to me herself.

I remember the day the wrapping paper was peeled from around me – very _vintage_ wrapping paper, I might add – and I spotted the first glimpse of her eyes. They were alive. Like fantasy worlds, planets in themselves – moons and solar systems orbiting around them.

I'd been crafted with the needles of her devoted grandmother, each strand of yarn weaved into me like the pieces in a puzzle, the plot lines in a story. It was love at first sight.

She'd gasped – a mock gasp of course. She liked theatricals – and plucked me from the packaging, pulling me right on top of her head. Snug. Perfect. "How do I look?" she'd giggled to the rhythm of her delighted grandmother's clapping, sat in front of the Christmas Tree.

But like all Christmas presents, I was forgotten. Thrown in the corner of a room. Alone.

The dust smelled musty. It tasted like rat poison having a bubble bath. Gritty and foamy and _abandoned_. Just like me.

I felt lonely. Without a head to hold. Without ears to warm. Without _ideas_ to keep.

She found me the minute she discovered the news – that her Grandmother had died. My creator. I think I was what helped her cling onto the memory of her Grandmother, just like I clung onto the feel of her hands twisting the needles, weaving the yarn into the very fabric of me.

For a moment, I felt like I meant something. Like I _belonged_ somewhere.

I was a treasure for her. A memory, a piece of the past. And I kept her warm. Protected the imaginations within her brain, a shield for them. I like to think I kept them in.

I remember the first time I tasted those imaginations. They were delicious and lively and exciting. And there was always one person braided into each one. _Him_. The length of his smile, the exact blue hue of his eyes. I particularly enjoyed the shade of his hair. That's kind of my thing. Hair. _Heads_.

He took up a generous sized slot in her brain – a large slice in a pie chart. She liked those too. They were analytical. Interesting. She liked interesting things. You could make almost anything into a pie chart. What you'd had for dinner? How many times you'd yawned in one day? How many times he glanced at her, behind the rims of his glasses.

Her brain was on him again. It liked to switch. It happened quite frequently.

This time, though. She wasn't thinking about his eye colour or how many eyelashes he had or any pie chart recording _any_ thing about him. Her mind was haunted by the dimensions of his mouth – the one locked on a scream. Her mind trembled it. I _felt_ it. I felt the _fear._ The loss.

The _guilt_.

Her imaginations had come alive, thudding with theories on murderers and stalkers and _ghosts_. Her eyes had caught sight of things since she'd come back to this lodge. It had been cold, my yarn shivering. But her fantasies had kept me warm. They'd kept pushing us forward, shuddering with anxiety and shadows and _blood_.

She was determined. Her mind was trickling with the _need_ to know.

Now her mind is being flooded by yells of _"Help! Help!"_ She's thinking that she'll help her. She couldn't help Chris. She was too far away. But she can help this one.

Her hands reach for the handles of the trap door. I can feel her skin shiver with the cold. She grips around them. I cling onto her head, intertwining my yarn with her hair.

She yanks the doors open.

Silence.

Crackling.

Empty.

A screech rips through us, lunging for us.

She screams. It fills her brain. Like blood. Like blood drowning her skull.

Fear flings me off her head as it's torn from her body. Squelch. Sickening. Thud.

I collapse on the cold, hard floor. Blood soaks into my fabric, into the stray strands of my yarn.. It's like the dust. Like the emptiness, the abandonment.

It isn't her who's abandoned me this time.

It's me.

And there, she lays, her eyes frozen in fear, her mouth pulled tight into the exact same shape he'd adopted. She memorised the dimension.

And it's just her head. Abandoned. Void of a body.

Void of a _hat_.

She had never imagined this. Had never fantasized about _this._

I'm alone. We're alone. Dead, discarded. No longer memories of knitting needles or warm hair or alive minds.

Just the freezing feeling of empty fantasies, never fulfilled. Worthless. If only.

Heads. It used to be my kind of thing.


	5. Matt

Clothes hangers are so rigid. A tangled mess of metal, plastic and wood. They feel like bones, like sickly, snappable sticks. There is no _substance_ to their frames. They're dead, cold, tired things.

Not like his shoulders. His shoulders were broad. Strong and rippling like waters. And yet warm. Warm and inviting, as if they were made of blankets. Of clouds. _Huggable_.

It was easy to feel like I belonged around them. He didn't even need a changing room. He just effortlessly unhooked me, swung me from my hanger – thank _heavens_ , I was getting sick of that thing – and slid his fluid arms through me, settling me perfectly across his shoulders. Around his body.

He was easy to hold. His body felt generous, the warmth of compassion, the soft cashmere of authenticity in each muscle. He wasn't like others, not like their stiff limbs and harder hearts – albeit I haven't hugged _that_ many bodies in my time. But regardless, his felt perfect. A perfect fit.

And his heart. It felt so close to me. The gentle, reassuring thump-thump-thump.

And I was pretty smug when he immediately snagged the label off me – that thing was irritating my fabric – handed it to the cashier and bought me straight away.

Love at first sight. Or first _wear_. Whatever you want to call it.

He wore me like a cape. A badge of honour. I felt proud across his shoulders, the completion of a superhero. If I had any more abilities sewn into my cloth – more than making him look cool – I swear I could make him fly.

We were hardly ever parted. I rarely tasted the frothy bubbles of the washing machine, the clingy cotton of other clothing. Most mornings, he'd simply spray me with a generous dose of deodorant – is that really what that's for? – rest me across his jacket-shaped shoulders and leave the house feeling like he ruled the whole world.

Maybe it's my fault then. Why he thinks he can do it. Reach out with his muscle made, compassion built arm to save her – like the superhero he is. Like the superhero I made him.

His muscles stretch, aching. My fabric can't hold his strain of anguish, his panic. I'm being pulled taut. Closed to ripping. I cling to his skin. His dark, warm, sweat soaked skin. Dirt seeps into my very core. The remnants and ashes of fear, of frantic running. Of trying to escape.

There's no escape.

His heart is thumping against me, so close. Like it's rapping in my ears. Through my fabric. So fast. So panicked.

She's screaming. He shouts out, her body plummeting like rattling bones. Distant. Echoes. His veins squeeze and pop, straining to yell after her.

And he's jumping to his feet, the wood underneath it tipping. Creaking.

I grip him tighter.

With a blow, we're shoved through the air. His pain reverberates through me as his body smacks against the hard, rocky ledge. I feel his throbbing agony, her name hovering achingly on his lips. He's stretching to his feet, on worn, shaking legs. And I want to help him. I want to comfort him but all I can do is hug.

His breath feels constricted. Like I'm too tight around him.

Fire is hot around me, in this closed, ashy place, licking close to my material. I feel like burning.

His muscles are shaking within me. Scared. Terrified. I can't let go. I can never let go.

Shadows dance around us. He's whimpering her name.

And it's the last on his lips.

The creature. Whatever the hell it is, lunges for us. It digs its sharp claws deep into my fabric. The ripping vibrates through me. Like the sound of gritting teeth. He cries out in panic. In desperate pain.

He's scrambling about, arms flailing, jagged rocks stabbing me. Grazing me. Biting into me.

He's screaming for it to get off. I grasp onto him tighter. The sinking feeling of despair seeps into each bead of my fibre.

And his sweaty, panicked hands clamber across my material. My body. Perilously looking for something. Fear grips me. I don't have anything. There's nothing. _Nothing!_

All I can give him is a cape. And what good is that _now_?

His cry cracks, the creature yanking him up. The air rushes past us – through us – like blood. Like thick, choking blood.

I can't breathe. I can't breathe.

He's flying. For once, I actually caused him to _fly._

And he's going to _die_.

The hook cracks into his jaw, piercing his throat. I can hear him gurgling out his last breath. Gasping for it. Choking on it.

The life drains out of his muscles. The warmth, the compassion. All empty. All _gone_.

Frustration kills me. Guilt kills me. Over and over and over again. They kill me.

Like hooks. Stabbing. Jabbing. _Piercing_. Damn meat hooks.

I'd take a clothes hanger over this any day.

Guilt gnaws and rips through my fibre, tearing it to shreds. I want to cry. I want to scream.

I want to die.

A drip of his blood hits me like a bullet. Seeping into my fibre. Like a stringy, red cobweb.

The energy drains from me too.

And there we hang limply from the hook. Dead. Lifeless. Hopeless. Like from a clothes hanger.

He was supposed to be a superhero. I was supposed to save him.

And, in the end; he flew.


	6. Emily

I'm extremely talented in harbouring secrets. Just stash them between my pages and their crisp, freshness will be preserved. Not that I'm trying to brag.

I kept his secrets for a long time. He trusted them to me, taping them to my pages, scribbling them down with pen. They were tattoos on my skin, forever etched with ink. Mine to keep.

Then. All of a sudden, like a gust of wind; he entrusted me to _her_.

I didn't know her for very long. In fact, the only sight I ever caught of her was from the dampness of a satchel, snatching glimpses of her between cracks in the bag's opening. It was uncomfortable. The leather wasn't entirely pleasant. The clamminess clung to my spine, to my cover, to my edges. Like condensation. And being trapped in between rigid, faceless flares isn't the most enjoyable of positions. It makes the spine stiff, you know. And the brain bored.

And I can't exactly vouch for the chicness of the bag either. It wasn't entirely _fashionable_. Not with the dirt smears across its leather and damp, musty smell. Not something that I would ever be seen dead with.

Which was, I suppose, the point. Not being _dead_.

I had felt the rough way she handled the bag, me rattling inside it as we ran. I could almost feel her adrenaline and panic through the satchel's material, like perspiration. Palpable. Like salt and sweat.

Her breaths were ragged but her movements jerked with purpose. With determination. I felt myself willing her to survive. Clinging onto the secrets between my pages like I clung onto her life. Like she clung onto _me_.

The creature. The _wendigo_. It bit her. I know, I heard her scream. It vibrated through me. The sound of squelching blood, the ripping of flesh, of teeth against muscle and bone.

I wanted to assure her. I wanted to show her it would be okay. I knew. He'd stored that secret in me. _"The_ _bite_ _is harmless"_ his fingers had scrawled, inking my skin. Each flick of the pen's nib was engrained into me. A memory. A _secret_.

It's going to be okay.

I kept telling myself that. Kept telling her that.

But - maybe it's not.

She's pleading for her life. I'm out in the open now, exposed. The bitter air biting at me. Corroding me. I can see her; the blood pooling at her shoulder, the courage moulding her lips, horrors still clinging to the ends of her hair like dried blood. The fear shaking in her eyes. Rattling. Piercing; like bullets.

She's facing one. The mouth of one; an ugly, black gun. Shivering, shaking, at the end of a man just as fearful as her.

Someone who can match her ferocity. Someone she used to relate to.

It's cold. The fear of death. It makes me shiver. Crinkle.

No! This isn't the end. She doesn't have to die.

I'm desperate. Pushing myself, gritting myself, to fly open my cover, flutter open my pages. But nothing. I have no strength. I have nothing. I'm useless.

_Open me!_ I'm willing someone, anyone. Find the secrets. Let them out.

Save her!

She curls up. Ready for the shot. Facing away.

Look at me! Find me!

He gave me to her to do this, to save her. This can't be the end.

It can't-

Bang! The gunshot vibrates through me; I've been shot too. Pain. Tight, desperate pain. Like I've been pierced right through my heart, right through my spine. Blood trickles down from her eye – like a tear. An empty eye socket. Void. Hollow. She can't look at me anymore. She can't find me anymore.

I'm lost. Worthless. _Useless_.

Hands fumble for me, in between mingled breaths and gasps and sobs. They cling to my cover; sticky and salty and _vile_.

Fingers pry me open. It's too late. There's nothing of me left; no energy, no strength.

The breath of the air flicks through my pages. Revealing the dead, wilting secrets. Dry petals. Dead scents.

They spill out. I have no strength left to keep them. It's like they're futile. As common as air.

I'm hollow. Just a spine, just covers, just pages. Empty.

The secrets, they aren't apart of me anymore.

They could have saved her. They could have been worth _everything_.

Now they're worthless.

So am I.


	7. Jessica

Her lips taste of practiced smiles. The flavour is distinct; like sandpaper, salt and cherries. Like the fragile, rubbery skin of cranberries – it would be effortless to pierce through them, to make them fall apart.

 

That's what I'm here for. To protect them. To cover them.

 

To pretend they don't exist.

 

My packaging promised _'The perfect sparkle for any outfit'_. And, of _course_ that's true. I pride myself in my sparkling abilities. But they'd branded me with such a _generic_ name, filtering in some word like _shimmer_ or _shine_ just because. Boring.

 

But _she'd_ rejuvenated me. She'd re-named me her ' _emergency lifesaver'_. Her sidekick. In any emergency, she'd whip me out of her purse, dab me across her lips and we'd be ready to conquer anything. By anything, I mean selfies. I'm a master at the duck face.

 

Do you know how refreshing it is to get out of laboratories and cosmetic stores? I'm still convinced I smell like chemicals. Chemicals have a weird property that they like to cling to the plastic of lip gloss. Attractive. _Great_ for me.

 

But she didn't mind. The popping feeling when she pulled my lid off was ridiculously satisfying. Her lips were sweet. And the fresh air was delicious!

 

But it felt a whole lot different to the air of a cold, mountain top.

 

There, I experienced her every feeling. Her every dancing breath.

 

I felt every flirtatious smile, every playful laugh, every bitter word. I moulded to them, to the shape of her lips. Her attraction to him was tangible. Her lips always quirked up when she saw him, like an instant reaction. I could feel her flirtation vibrating in every word.

 

And I tasted the sweetness of her kisses, the ones she shared with him. And the secret words she'd only ever let me feel. The ones that whispered of vulnerability and insecurities. The reasons she had me in the first place.

 

The reasons she was willing to share with him.

 

And now I can feel the ripping of his name from her lungs. Her screams, crying out for him.

 

And I'm shaking. Quivering.

 

And I want to shield her. I want to save her.

 

I want to be her _lifesaver._ Her _sidekick_.

 

I want to prove my names.

 

But I can't.I can't save her from this.

 

Her breaths are heavy. Heavy, choking breaths. They taste like fear. Like sticky, quivering fear.

 

I'm clinging to the last shred of skin on her lips. They're dry. They're scared.

 

They can't hold fake smiles anymore.

 

And I can't protect them.

 

The fingers – the bony, rotting fingers – slice into her mouth. Pain drips down like blood. Nails dig into her gums. I can feel them. I can feel her screams bubbling, vibrating. _Dying_.

 

I can feel the rotting skin pressed against me, pressed against her lips. It feels like maggots. It smells like death. Oh, what I'd trade to smell the chemicals of a laboratory again.

 

The claw rips her jaw from her bones. I can _feel_ the crack. I can _feel_ her pain. It tears me in half, just like it tears her lips apart.

 

And she tumbles. She falls, cracking her back on a cold, sharp, elevator floor. Her breath snaps off like a twig. Like it weighed nothing at all.

 

I can hear his raw cries, yelling her name. But they're distant. I'm smothered by blood. By the feeling of cold, dead skin.

 

She's gone. Her lips are gone. Her smiles are gone.

 

And I'm nothing.

 

I'm worthless.

 


	8. Josh

He could have at _least_ showered. Or insisted on taking that bath with her. He stunk. I can still feel his sweat clinging to me like a bad odour. Can still taste the veins of it that beaded at his forehead, ran down his nose and soaked into my plastic. It makes me want to shrivel up. Maybe in a fire, that would do it.

 

I was a cheap buy on eBay. I suppose that was to make up for the thousands of dollars spent on, you know, _saws_. Also pigs. He had to _cut down_ on _somewhere_. Pun intended.

 

Not that I'm complaining. I was already fed up with being stuck in some horror enthusiasts cupboard. I'm pretty sure I started to smell of mouldy pizzas and dust. _Yum_. Note, I'd be eye rolling at this point – if I had any eyes to roll.

 

But he was my eyes. He was the one who gave me life, gave me expressions. Gave me words. I moulded onto his face, the sculpting of his cheek bones, the crease lines on his forehead.

 

And I felt the twitching too. The insistent spasm of his nerves, the choking of his breaths. The whirring in his brain, calculating every moment. His cheeks shuddered with the excited desire for revenge.

 

And it made sense. It was what gave me life, his desperate need for revenge. Every moment was perfectly timed, each flick of a switch a memory of his sisters. Each movement a stab in his chest for not being able to save them.

 

I felt the shuddering of every single emotion vibrate through my silicone. It's the closest I've ever felt to someone. Not that I'm saying I don't get any _action_.

 

But this was different. Because, behind me, he didn't have to be himself. He could hide. He could hide in me – hide from the monsters and the machines in his mind.

 

I gave him confidence.

 

He gave _me_ confidence.

 

And I have been ripped from him. He ripped me from him.

 

And, as soon as he did, they fired at him. They spat words at him, stabbing him with cracked misunderstanding. And I wasn't there to protect him. I wasn't there for him to hide behind.

 

He slipped me from his fingers, falling limp onto a cold, damp basement floor. My plastic smacked, lifeless, abandoned.

 

I've been here ever since. Waiting. Forever. Melting into the rotting floorboards, the memories of the gunshots and the saws vibrating through me. It's worse than being on Ebay. It's worse than the pigs.

 

Because he's gone. He's not coming back.

 

The roof crumbles, ash covering me, clogging me. It smells worse than he ever did.

 

The flames are gone now. The voices, the ones that were shouting at him, the ones that were crying in fear, are gone too. Replaced by cracking silence.

 

And then an uneven footstep splits the air. Snapping wood, grinding ash.

 

Grunting. Twisted breathing. Popping of limbs.

 

He's here.

 

I feel him.

 

I see him, unnaturally leaning over, peering, cracking his neck.

 

His face, it's twisted with ripped skin and hunger. His eyes, the ones that used to belong to me, are clouded over, no longer his own.

 

It's a mask. He has a new mask, one he's hiding behind. One that has _consumed_ him.

 

And he's not the same. He's not _him_ anymore.

 

I'd give anything to have that stinky, sweaty face back again.

 

But, right now, I don't care.

 

Because He came. He came back for me.

 

I'm not alone anymore.

 

I sure hope he showered.

 

 


	9. Beth

The fear. It's tumbling through her veins, thumping on her pulse. Sweat pools in her palms, clinging to my case, seeping into my cartridge.

The screams. They still vibrate through me, matching the exact same tone as her voicemail. _"Hey, you got Beth!"_ is coded into my SIM card. _"I'm probably too preoccupied with Instagram to answer. Catch you later!"_

She used to talk to me. Press me against her cheek, her laugh vibrating through her skin. She'd pass secrets through me, borrowed gossip. Sibling promises.

It was intimate. A friendship established through words and whispers. And the personalisation of a ring tone.

Her life – our shared lives – have been recorded through ring tones. The soothing tones of Say Something when she ended things with that one boyfriend who'd broken her heart. Before He Cheats from when Josh broke that same boyfriend's nose. That one popular Evanescence song during her Emo phase. Spice Up Your Life from when Hannah played that prank on her sister. A terrifying, heavy metal song from when _Josh_ played his own prank.

And the most recent; Lean On.

_Blow a kiss, fire a gun, we need someone to lean on._

The words, the tones are a part of me. Their residue sticks to my speakers.

And so does her sweat.

Her hoarse voice is distant. The further it has ever been from me. It cries out for her sister. _Hannah!_ My light flickers, the one she switched on. Panicked breaths vibrate through her arm into me, the pulse in her wrist thrumming.

She's running. She clasps me in her hand, her sister in the other.

_Hannah!_

It's close. Whatever it is, I can feel it's sticky, rotting breath cling to my plastic cover. My light flickers over it's bony, jarring, bone-white skin, caught in between the trees.

I shake.

She shakes.

The wood cracks underneath their panicked, racing feet. Splinters and fear and sweat.

I slip. Out of her grasp. Out of her mind.

 _SMASH!_ My case collides with the wood. It cracks through my screen. Like the breaking of spines against rocks, against cliffs.

I topple through the cracks in the bridge, stinking into damp earth, buried alive. Black ink seeps into my screen, like blood. I can't see. I feel the earthworms and the maggots and moss crawl over me, sticking to me. Erasing her sweat, her smell, her pulse.

But I can _hear_.

She's crying out, whimpering. So far away. So close.

My light flickers, the one she switched on. It darts through the earth riddle holes in the wood, not close enough, not far enough. Never reaching far enough.

Helpless. I need to do something. I want to hack into that music, the ring tones. Anything to distract it. Anything to save her.

_Blow a kiss._

She screams.

_Fire a gun._

Stones scrape and tumble. I hear her fall. I hear her and her sister fall.

I fall too.

 _CRACK!_ Screens. Lights. Ink. Like the breaking of spines against rocks, against cliffs.

_We need someone to lean on._

She dies. They die.

I die.

Soggy earth rots me. Seeping into my SIM card, erasing any instance that she ever belonged to me. Any memories that she ever shared in secret with me.

They search for her. I feel their boots pass over me, hear the wood creak.

I'm here. Find me.

_Hey, you got Beth!_

Find me. Search for me.

Their heavy feet pass over me over and over again. I have no energy.

She gave me energy. She gave me life. She gave me secrets.

She's dead.

 _Find me_ , I croak out through electronic waves as my battery dies, my light weak and dead. My screen can barely keep itself alive as it soaks to black. _Find her_.

They never do.


	10. Hannah

 

Her skin rots. It itches. I crawl like maggots underneath it. I bleed. Inky black blood in the shape of a butterfly.

The needle had pierced me into her. I had felt her heartbeat in her hot skin. Thu Thump. Thu Thump. Thu Thump. She had breathed. Her blood had soaked into my ink. Connected.

A marriage contract between skin and liquid.

Except that, _maybe_ , I wasn't the one she was fantasising about marrying.

He'd always be there, thumping underneath her skin. Through her veins. Him and his unrealistic hair. Him sliding through her veins like he'd even gotten an inch close to her. I could feel the two syllables of his name drumming through her pulse. Thu Thump. Thu Thump. Thu Thump. It was almost like I was written in _his_ skin. As if I was written in _his_ own blood.

Twitch. Crack. HUNGR- She breathes. Shudder. Slobber.

Fingers had traced me. Of friends. Twins. Brothers. Murmurings of questions. Of stabbing _whys_ – or appreciative humming. Never mentioning him. Never muttering the way he directed her veins. I might as well have been in the shape of his _name_ instead. It couldn't have been more obvious.

And yet she had given me wings. But I couldn't fly away. I was embedded in her. Her skin was my chains. Her heart was my being.

And I remember when he broke it.

It shattered like ice.

Like the snow around us. Enveloping us as her tears dripped onto me, freezing into icicles. The cold air had frozen me. Chipped away at my wings. Sobs had shuddered her broken heartbeat as she ran.

HUNGRRRRRR-

Away. Away away, her pulse had insisted. Run away. Run run.

First it was from him. From the cracking of her heart, the splitting in half of it. The snapping of twigs and crushing of snow. Then it was nothing to do with him at all. Fear had pounded through her body. I had felt it spill into my ink.

Gurgle. Wretch. Snap. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRR-

She'd pooled like blood at the bottom of that cliff. Sobbing. Dragging a twin. Dragging a life. Dragging death. Her skin ached. With grief and pain and broken bones.

And hunger.

Twitch. Groan. GRREEEEEE-

If I could have, I would have sprouted wings on her back. I would have helped her escape. I would have- I would have-

Her neck snaps.

She rots. Her skin itches. Nerves twitching violently under me. Wood around me. Wood and fire and cabins.

I ache. Of old, lost hope. Of rotting wings.

Her teeth chatter. Teeth that don't belong to her. In a skull that isn't hers. Wrapped in cold, stringy skin. Not hers. Not hers. Not hers.

HUUUUNNNGRRRYYYYYYYY

Lives dart and die. I choke on her dead blood. On the mindless, empty thumping of her dead pulse. Of her cold, shattered heart.

His eyes had seen her. Seen me. Amongst the pools of fear and death and lost hope. The eyes of a brother. And his lips had spoken her name. Cried it out like it was the last time it would ever be cried.

Now around us is scattered empty lives. Friends. Twins. Hers.

HUUUUUUUUUUUNNNGGRRRRYYYYY

Her neck cracks. She screams. She lunges.

I fly.

The world bursts. Flame and colour and skin.

And she rots. She burns. Burning like the flimsy paper of a marriage contract.

Flesh. Flesh and chains burn.

 _My_ chains burn.

Wings free. I breathe. She dies. Finally, she dies.

She needed to die.

She had died long before this.

And I fly. Fly away, into the smoke filled air.

Broken, empty wings. Wings that she gave me.

I dissolve.


	11. The Stranger

I'm gripped in the sticky, sweaty palms of a stranger. The heartbeat thrumming in his wrists don't belong to the one I know. _His_ pulses are worn and ancient, thick and rough. _This_ strangerrattles with young, shuddering fear.

He never trusts me with anyone else. I don't trust _him_ with anyone else. My metal is melted into his skin. His veins of soot and gunpowder are woven into me, pulsing life into my barrel. Steady hands, a family trait; solid aim, a gift of time. Powerful impact; that's all me.

We started when time began. He was sixteen. I was stubborn. His fingerprint had convulsed over my stiff, crisp trigger. I'd leaned into his shoulder with a crack and a sigh. His fear was in his breath and determination in his grip. I'd willed him on, my barrel warm and pulsating – like the crackling coals on a fire or the grainy sizzling of a hot pan.

And he'd jabbed his finger into my trigger. Crack! Bang! My bullet biting through the caving, shattered metal of the can. Crisp and sharp. The first target.

Not the last. Never the last.

We fought battles together.

I'd cut into rotten skin and torn teeth. The thrill of the rush, of the attack. He'd guide my eyes. He'd give me strength. I'd give him power.

The shrieks of our targets would bounce off the walls of the cave, their stringy, decaying bodies thrown around like rag dolls. Trapped in the cages of their bones. They were powerless.

We were invincible.

Until we weren't.

Because he's not. He's empty. His palms are empty. He's empty amongst the snow, the ash waiting for the blood. The stranger grips me with his foreign, sticky fingers. I want to curse at him. There is no determination in him. Not like _the_ him I belong to _._ This stranger – he is all fear.

The shrieks, they echo in the night sky. They are quick. Too quick.

I need to aim. I need to shoot. Shoot. Shoot. Aim. Pull Trigger. Shoot. But I can't work without limbs. Without hands and fingers and shoulders. And this foreigner is weak. A tumbling mess. He doesn't know me. He doesn't know the curves of my metal. His veins are disconnected from me, thrumming somewhere else. Cutting short.

No. No. This is all wrong. It's all foreign hands. Foreign palms. Foreign sweat.

Wrong hands, wrong palms. Wrong _sweat_.

He should have kept me. He shouldn't have given me away. I am a part of him. He needs me.

_I_ need him.

The sky cuts with a choke. Blood gurgles, creatures cackle. The stranger's throat cracks.

His head tumbles. Thumps. Rolls. The blood tastes like gunpowder. My barrel chokes on bullets. No more hands. Fingers. Shoulders.

The stranger stumbles back. I burn in his hands. Red hot metal. He blasts at my trigger. Oh yeah. Now he wants to shoot? But it's too late. The hands that belong to me – that I belong to. That are melted into my metal. They're gone.

Empty.

I hate this stranger.

Shrieks are blurred out by my bullets. One by one by one. They drain me, sucking the life out of me. My metal shrinks into the heat.

He's crying out. He's running. He's running.

I'm losing.

I'm empty.

The bony rag dolls crack across the sky.

And this time the stranger falls. Head tumbles. Thumps. Rolls.

And I fall with him. There is nothing to fall to.

Except the cold, bitter taste of blood and snow. And the freezing chill over my barrel. Like the coals of a fire that have been kicked out.

* * *

I used to be able to fit perfectly across the bridge of his nose...


End file.
